The Cranston East 13-14 year-old All-Stars blanked Chariho 5-0 on Wednesday evening during the first round of the RI State Tournament at Whipple Field.

East starting pitcher Chris Barboza tossed 6 2/3 shutout innings and struck out 12 batters, while giving up just one hit and one walk.

Chariho left fielder Sam Ellis had the hit and catcher Milo Clarke earned the walk.

Barboza also led the East offense with a hit, a walk, and the only run batted in.

“He’s amazing, man,” East manager Nestor Santana said. “I can’t say enough good things about that kid. He has the discipline of a guy that’s projected to be a big-leaguer someday.”

The other four runs came on errors and East was combative running the base paths.

“We’re aggressive,” Santana said. “We take chances. We always feel like we can put the bat on the ball. Probably took one too many chances tonight. Had a few guys that were thrown out, but I’ll live with it. As long as we’re playing aggressive-branded baseball that’s the way I like to coach, that’s the way they like to play. And that makes it fun.”

East’s Elan Santana added two singles and reached base on an error, while Damien Wholey had a walk, a single, and a triple.

“I think we have a ton of talent on this team,” Santana said. “There’s a lot of young guys that are really, really good. I can’t say enough about them. We’re missing one big guy, so we had a little gap in the batting order and I think that’s something that I have to adjust for the next game. But overall, we threatened every inning, our defense was solid, and our hitting was solid. We’re a hitting team. If we put the bat on the ball against the best pitchers we always have a chance. So, I can’t say enough good things about my guys tonight.”

Landon Sumner started for Chariho and pitched four 2/3 innings, yielding one unearned run on six hits, and two walks, with one hit batsman, and eight strikeouts.

Following the quarterfinal win over Chariho, Santana was excited for his team to play Cumberland, who East would topple 15-3 during the semifinal round on Friday night.

“I think you’re playing champions at this level,” Santana said. “Everybody’s good. You’re only one bad break away from an ‘L’ but I feel confident about these guys. We don’t wait for somebody else to do it for us. We go out there and do it with the bat, and we do it with the defense. So, it’s going to be tough to beat us, I think. Chariho has a really good team, really good pitching. So, we’re ready for Cumberland, we’re ready to move on and hopefully we’re ready to take states.”

East played again on Tuesday in the state championship game. That score was unavailable at press time.